“I have always wanted to have my own drone that could send back a live video feed,” he writes.

And so he’s been experimenting – with some success – by attaching cameras to remote controlled planes and helicopters.

The advances in technology, both in the aircraft and the cameras, mean that “it is extremely easy to build a drone now that can do not just surveillance but can carry rather large payloads”, writes Fukuyama, who is these days a senior fellow Stanford.

And he knows he needs to hurry.

I don’t have to spell out the implications of this. I want to have my drone before the government makes them illegal. The US has been fighting such low-tech enemies lately that we haven’t thought through the nature of a world in which lots of people have sophisticated drones, not just other countries but private individuals.

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What is it with foreign policy theorists and drones lately? Foreign Policy published online yesterday a slide show, “Drones: A Photo History”, introduced thus:

We think of drones as a modern invention, but they’ve been part of warfare for longer than you think. Here’s a look at the evolution of drones and the way they’ve changed how war works.